MADAN B. LOKUR, J.

( 1 ) THE Petitioner is an international airline having its main office in Bombay. It also has an office in Delhi where it has employed certain staff.

( 2 ) SOMETIME in 1986, the Petitioner proposed to streamline its functioning in Delhi and as a part of its proposal, it planned to hand over the ticketing work in the Delhi office to a General Sales Agent (GSA ). This would have rendered surplus some employees in the ticketing section in the Delhi office. With a view to avoid any hardship to its employees, the Petitioner proposed to transfer them to its other establishments in India or to be retrenched after due compensation as per law alongwith an offer of alternative employment with the GSA.

( 3 ) THE employees of the Petitioner, through their association that is Respondent No. 3, raised an industrial dispute. Since conciliation proceedings failed, the Delhi Administration referred the following dispute to the Industrial Tribunal on 27th February 1986: --

"whether the proposed action of the Management in giving ticketing work on contract to M/s General Sales Agent is illegal and/or unjustified and if so, what directions are necessary in this respect. "

( 4 ) SUBSEQUENTLY, the Petitioner intended to pass on its cash handling and accounting work to its GSA from 1st September 1986. Respondent No. 3 raised another dispute in this regard and when the conciliation process did not succeed in respect of this dispute also, the Delhi Administration made the following reference to the Industrial Tribunal on 31st December 1986: --

"whether the proposed action of the Management in handing over disbursements of payments, handling of accounts and its other operations to General Sales Agent is illegal and/or justified and if not, what directions are necessary in this respect. "

( 5 ) BOTH the above references were registered before the Industrial Tribunal as ID No. 18 of 1986 and ID No. 22 of 1987 respectively. Feeling aggrieved by the reference of these disputes to the Industrial Tribunal, the Petitioner preferred a writ petition in this Court challenging the legality and validity of the reference orders. On 18th February 1987, a Division Bench admitted the writ petition and further proceedings before the Industrial Tribunal were stayed. On 22nd April 1987, a learned Single Judge confirmed the interim order pending disposal of the writ petition because learned counsel for the Respondents stated that they had no objection to the continuance of the interim order.

( 6 ) LEARNED counsel for the Petitioner submitted before me that it is the general international practice to appoint a GSA to handle some aspects of the airline business. In fact the International Air Transport Authority (IATA) has accepted and recognized this practice. Learned counsel placed before me Resolution 800 being Passenger Sales Agency Rules. Section 1 thereof defines General Sales Agent as meaning "any person to whom a Member or a non IATA carrier has delegated general authority to represent it for purposes of sales of passenger and/or cargo air transportation in a defined territory and who is remunerated accordingly. " It is submitted that since the appointment of a GSA is a well accepted practice, all that the Petitioner was wanting to do was to streamline and improve its functioning in Delhi. It was submitted that the decision to appoint a GSA is essentially a business decision and cannot form the subject matter of any industrial dispute or industrial adjudication. It was submitted that the references were premature because the proposed actions may or may not have had any adverse impact on any of the employees and members of Respondent No. 3. It was prayed that under these circumstances, the references deserve to be quashed. It was stated that during the pendency of the writ petition the Petitioner had already appointed its GSAs and no adverse impact was felt by any of the employees; this was all the more reason for quashing the references.

( 7 ) THE agg

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